Falling for your Fate

Chapter 15

Chapter 15

We'd been walking for an hour now and I thought my legs were going to drop off and I had so many cuts on my feet it stung with every step. I wanted to tell Breadon to stop, or slow down at least but he looked so cold and determined. His grip was tight on my wrist as he marched me through the forest. From the look in his eyes I knew he was speaking with members of his pack for most of our trip so far. I could only imagine the trouble I had caused.

'Ah,' I exclaimed as a sharp twig pierced my foot. Dropping to the forest floor, my arm easily breaking out of Breadon's hold. Barely able to see in the dark night I started fumbling with my foot to get the twig out.

'Leora? What's wrong?' Breadon asked worriedly as he crouched down beside me.

'Nothing, I'm fine. It was just a twig or something.'

'Where are your shoes?' He frowned, looking around for them.

'Umm, I lost them a while back,' I shrugged, finally pulling the twig free.

'What? Why didn't you tell me?' He demanded and I cringed away from his disapproving tone.

'I-I didn't want to be a bother...well, even more than I already was.' I answered softly.

'God baby, look at this, your feet are all torn up,' he scolded, looking at the multiple cuts I was sporting on my now bare feet.

'I didn't mean to,' I muttered, using the closest tree to get myself back on my feet.

'What do you think you're doing?' He frowned, getting to his feet as well.

'Walking?'

'How do you expect to walk with your feet all cut up like that?'

'Well, I'm not going to sit around here all night.' I grumbled, taking a few tentative steps in the direction we had been walking. I only took a few steps before I was clutching a tree for support and wincing in pain.

'Baby girl, stop,' he sighed, coming over to my side. 'You're never going to make it back to the house with your feet like that.'

'Then what do you suggest?' I huffed, sagging against the tree and glaring at the forest floor.

'Come here,' and in an instant he had me draped over his arms and pressed firmly to his chest.

'What are you doing?' I asked nervously as he started walking determinedly down an incline with clear, running water at the bottom of it.

'Just relax baby girl,' he ordered, kneeling beside the water and gently sitting me at his side. I tensed as his hand wrapped around my ankle. I eyed him cautiously, waiting for his next move. His eyes were focused on my feet as he dipped them into the freezing water. I let out a hiss of pain as my skin was assaulted by the chilling water and instinctively I tried to pull them back. Breadon tightened his hold and kept them submerged under the water and I tried unsuccessfully to buck myself from his hold.

The water ran over my cuts, cleaning them of the blood and dirt which had been caked on them from walking for so long.

'You can take them out now baby,' he murmured as my body started to tremble from the cold. I wrapped my arms around myself tightly as Breadon rested my feet in a damp patch of grass before he reached for my skirt.

'What are you doing?' I asked anxiously, remembering, not for the first time, how alone we were.

'I need to wrap your feet in something Leora,' he explained slowly. I eyed him cautiously, not certain of his intentions as his hands remained hovering over my skirt.